


like water, like wine

by kizzie



Category: The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller
Genre: Achilles POV, Angst, Ficlet, M/M, canon-compliant character death, u know what i mean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-17
Updated: 2017-02-17
Packaged: 2018-09-25 02:05:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9797627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kizzie/pseuds/kizzie
Summary: I close my eyes and we are back in Scyros once again.





	

**Author's Note:**

> It's been a while since I've read the book, but there you are. Maybe someday if I get the impulse, I'll write a longer patrochilles fic, but who knows?

Heroes don't have the luxury of happiness. I know this now, too late. Patroclus was the hero of the two of us. I remember it now, each and every detail in brutal vividness.

I close my eyes and we are back in Scyros once again. Before this, when his eyes closed softly in sleep, and not like this. I do not want to think about what happens now. I wish to forget that it is my fault, that it should have been me spilling blood into the earth, alone. That I will be, soon.

We are back in Scyros. His body is warm and filled with life; we have decided to stay. I wish I had been stronger. _Let's stay here,_ I imagine myself saying. _Curse the war. Curse Hector and the Trojans, and whole of Greece as well._ Patroclus smiles.

But this fantasy is not right. Even here, I cannot find peace, feeling my bones grate against themselves as I dissolve. No war to fight, nor battles to win. Only Patroclus there beside me as I grow restless, tear myself to shreds. Patroclus is cold in my arms. The tent is beginning to smell of rotting flesh, and I cannot bring myself to care.

These images my mind conjures are worse than the war itself. It shatters me to think that Patroclus is dead, but it is crueler to picture him alive. To imagine a life where we live in quiet domesticity. Even if I decide I’d rather fade out of glory, it is too late.

I close my eyes, think of Scyros. The nights we brought wine to our rooms and let it slosh over the brims of our cups. Licked the sweetness off eager lips, let our hands wander like the world had narrowed down to just the two of us. Some occasions when we touched, like this one, there would be laughter, grinning into each other's mouths like foolish children.

I never told him, but those were my favorite. From the time we left Scyros, there were never enough of them, although I am only noticing it now. What else haven't I noticed? What might I have noticed about Patroclus had I been better, more attentive, more considerate as a warrior and as a lover? My chest burns. It feels like I’ve been cut open, like the gods have ripped open my skin and dug their hands inside without my knowledge. That I curse this war is a great understatement.

I close my eyes, wipe drying salt from days of crying off my cheek. I close my eyes. And I try to think of nothing at all.


End file.
